Fly Southwest: PWM to Denver, Colorado

Oh, the glamorous world of flying on Southwest Airlines! They say, "you get what you pay for," but with Southwest, it's more about what they managed to forget when calculating the airfare.

Situated on the precipice between the Pacific Northwest and a parallel universe of unparalleled weirdness, Portland's undefined springs to life as a smorgasbord of eco-conscious hipsters and artisanal coffee shops. The kind of place where direct flights are seen as an aesthetically pleasing geometric line, comforting to the discerning eye of a minimalist. That's exactly what Southwest does with its direct flights from Portland to Denver, a riveting one-way journey skipping through the clouds, tip-toeing across states in a miraculous dismissal of gravity.

Excuse our facetiousness. What we mean, dear globe-trotters, is that Southwest strips down the frills of premium economy and first-class, plays a sensational cosmic joke, and yet remarkably, packages it as the 'cheapest flights'. Talk about a grand satirical spectacle on air! The airline transforms the meaning of cheap flights from a budget-friendly benison to a wishful thinking with an ironic twist. You'll marvel at your standards falling faster than the cruelly curtailed baggage allowance.

While some airways give you slightly flat glasses of expensive champagne and a delectable assortment of snacks in business class, Southwest offers a selection of crackers and a rapid-fire round-trip down the economy class. Add in a deliriously poetical in-flight service, ever-ready to remind you of the airline's no-frills policy, and your flight duration plummets figuratively to get you to Denver faster.

Southwest’s ingenious inversion of services could be viewed as an endearing parody of the audacious opulence in other airlines. Or it can easily be seen as an imitating 'SNL' skit gone complete awry with the so-called "non-stop" flight. True, the flight won’t make an unscheduled pit stop anywhere between Portland and Denver, but their layover in the realm of sanity is a debatable one.

We must give credit where it's due, though. Southwest's flight cancellation policy is beautifully designed as an endeavor to redefine chaos. Rising above the simple concept of refunds, they've championed fabulous confusion – rewards or no rewards? Could be either, or neither. If this doesn’t playfully satirize the other airlines' intricately methodical policies, nothing will.

While technically international flights are out of this discussion’s scope, how can one avoid marveling at native Southwesterners' ability to make an out-of-country experience while merely navigating domestic flights? Your "Denver", pronounced with a thoroughly Southwestern drawl, can suddenly seem as foreign as Tibet. But don't worry, that’s all part of the grand Southwest show that just happens to include your last-minute flights.

And the grandeur of Southwest doesn't end here; one can't ignore the frequent flyer program's awe-inspiring mockery of certain mileage program. There have been historical records of the blessed ones who've defied the laws of logic and time to earn a reward, which they describe as nothing less than a Himalayan endeavor.

So, dear traveler, as you plan your flights and pore over airline reviews, remember that Southwest offers an ironic, satirical adventure in the disguise of a commute. They challenge the usual luxuries, and instead, offer the heartening warmth of knowing that materialistic comforts aren’t everything. An odd source of comfort, perhaps. But then again, this is the enigmatic, economy-defying Southwest, throwing pomp to the wind, reminding us all of a time when cheap air tickets truly meant cheap flights!